Smash Cut

Here’s a new one for ya: a remake of an action-packed Hong Kong box-office and film-fest hit has been completed.

“Waitaminit,” I hear you screaming, “how is that unusual? After all, Chinese movies get remade for Western markets all the time, right?”

True, true. But this one is, at the very least, a more curious effort than the usual watered-down, big-budget, Hollywood tinkering.

Newsmakers (a.k.a. Goryachiye novosti) is a Russian reworking of acclaimed Hong Kong genre darling Johnnie To’s Breaking News, his clever 2004 media/TV satire that successfully balanced stylish gunplay (including an amazing seven-minute-long opening tracking shot) with socially-driven barbs.

I wouldn’t have been surprised if Tinseltown had immediately greenlit its own version of the film, but the fact that Russia tackled it — helmed by Swedish director Anders Banke no less — is kind of ballsy, I have to say. Granted, Newsmakers could be such a by-the-numbers reinterpretation that, like a lot of remakes, it won’t have any real cinematic value, but you can certainly color me perplexed for the time being.

You can watch the English-subtitled first teaser for Newsmakers here.

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